NBA justice

The NBA has been conducting a draft lottery since 1985, when the Knicks won Patrick Ewing in a random drawing of envelopes. Yeah, that was by chance.

The NBA went to a weighted (ping-pong-ball) system in 1990 to put aside talk that the lottery was rigged. I am among those who do not dismiss the conspiracy theories. I think the NHL draft lottery is rigged, as well. Just as the Minnesota Timberwolves are perpetually screwed, so are, say, the Jackets.

What do I have to base this on? Not much. I just enjoy a good conspiracy and there’s a lot of weirdness to the draft lottery. Also, I think teams should be rewarded for tanking. How is it that the Timberwolves have never won the NBA lottery, after all their tanking? They lost tonight with the best chance to win. It’s rigged. The NBA doesn’t care about Minneapolis, especially since Prince denied Mike Fratello entry to a private party during the 1994 All-Star Weekend. Fratello didn’t have an invitation, and he was irked. From what I heard, that was a seriously freaky party. Ask Shaq.

Tonight, the rigged lottery provided another form of NBA justice. This was a big makeup call, pure and simple. The Cleveland Cavaliers, still smarting from a civic spanking by LeBron James, won the lottery with a pick they acquired in the Mo Williams deal with the LA Clippers. That pick had a 2.8-percent chance of winning. It came up. What luck!

The Cavs will have the No. 1 and the No. 4 overall picks.

What now? My knee-jerk reaction:

There’s a lot of talk that Duke point guard Kyrie Irving is the best prospect in a draft that has no clear hoss. Given that there are two other dynamic point guards who are also among the top five or six picks – Kentucky’s Brandon Knight and UConn’s Kemba Walker – I don’t know if taking Iriving No. 1 overall is the right way to go.

I am thinking about taking Arizona forward Derrick Williams with the top pick – dude is a freak – and then snapping up Knight or Walker with the fourth pick.